Urban agriculture may be inefficient, but it’s a model for a sustainable future

It’s time we learned to embrace inefficiency. That may sound like heresy in a time when we are told that we must increase our competitiveness to become leaner, to increase productivity, to become more efficient to compete in the global marketplace.

The burgeoning urban and near-urban agriculture trend in North America and around the world exemplifies how many small-scale, entrepreneurial businesses are inherently inefficient in how much labour they use. But this is something we should encourage and recognize as important for both economies and societies. When we talk about efficiency, we are usually talking about producing the most product or service for the least input or cost, including labour cost. But this definition of efficiency is counterproductive for job creation and for the environment. In Canada, we’ve seen a shift from large, industrial employers to service and entrepreneurial sector jobs.